It’s in the fascia

(Photo from Blackroll)

Seems like this topic, Fascia, is popping up EVERYWHERE. Must be the new buzz word in the fitness world…which doesn’t surprise me, honestly, because it’s something that wasn’t really studied in the body until about 10 years ago. And now that we know more about it…we want to talk about, share it…experience it in our practices. 

When I was doing my 300 hour teacher training with Yoga Medicine over the last 2 years, one of my electives was Myofascia Release and it was 55 hours of learning all about this beautiful container in the body…fascia. I was so amazed to use the myofascia balls and feel a difference in my own body and practice that I had to start teaching it. For about a year, I taught a class that was just myofascia release with a little yoga nidra at the end. It was a pretty magical class. Don’t worry- it will be coming back soon…just have to get my travel sorted and find a day that will work so I don’t have to miss it often! 

When Amanda and I decided to go to our cadaver training (if you haven’t seen the blog post on that yet, you should go check it out here…), I was so excited because I was finally going to understand what the fascia looks like, feels like and what it does for the body on an actual body. I had all these expectations that the fascia was going to be this thick layer under the skin that was easy to find and stood out like a body suit…what we saw was something completely different, beautiful and magical. 

This encasing for the muscles and tissues is transparent, extremely thin, and so strong. It isn’t just a solid casing for the body, it’s embedded in the tissues of the body. Imagine the various muscles that make up the hamstring (hamstring, IT band, tensure fascia lattea…) each of these muscles have their OWN fascia casing that sits inside the bigger fascia casing that makes up the hamstring. What? It has layers?! Sometimes it was very easy to see and find as we removed layers of the body, and other times it was severely adhesed to the tissues because there had been limited mobility or movement on that part of the body for some time. Even as it was adhesed, it still held such integrity, doing its primary job. Hydrating what it can and protecting the precious muscles and tissues that allow the body to do what it needs to do. 

That comment from Todd, our master discector, “The body seeks perfection, always”, was such a great reminder as we saw healthy tissue, tissue impacted by radiation from cancer and tissue from lifelong ailments. The fascia supported the tissues as best it could, even if that meant it had to repattern where it went. One of our models had had a hysterectomy…curious, we wanted to see what the fascia had done around the scar tissue. It followed the insertion, patterned along the insert of the cut and had growth to the connecting fascia that was rough and “un-natural” patterning compared to the fascia that had not been impacted. Same for the side she had scoliosis on…where the S curve in her spine at created limited range of motion in her upper body…the fascia supporting the transverse abdonminis (the casing that hugs the body like a corset from the spine around to the belly, holding everything in for us) was thick, ropey and patterned differently than on the side that had more range of motion…it was smooth, flexible and patterned in one cohesive  direction. 

Compare that to the model that had more intact muscle groups…and the fascia that surrounded the hamstring was intact, fluid in direction and glided with the movement of the leg as we moved it in different directions to see how the fascia interacted with the muscles themselves. Again that word, gliding of the tissue…when the fascia was intact and moving in the same direction with no adhesions or injury, the body just glided with movement. It’s beautiful. Where the body had adhesions or injury, the range of motion for the body was limited and the tissues didn’t glide. They stuck. An arm impacted by arthritis and osteoporosis and in a permeant state of tension, where we couldn’t fully straighten the arm…one small cut in the fascia at the shoulder loosened the whole arm. 

Yep. 

Loosened the whole arm. 

I could keep going with all the things learned just on the fascia, but I’ll leave you with a few thoughts for now. 

1. The body is amazing and is designed to survive. The fascia repatterns itself to support the integrity of the body, whatever that might look like…even if it’s not like the rest of the fascia in places of injury or that have been harmed. 

2. When we teach about fascia, and “hydration of the tissues”, it has me thinking so much about the fact that the fascia has to be in a place where it can help the tissue glide…the encasing that protects the muscle is there to make sure the muscle/tissue isn’t damaged, and so by putting pressure on a spot through pin and stretch or through cross fibering, we are encouraging the muscles/tissues to allow for hydration not only in the fascia through collagen and hyloranic acid…but also through blood flow in the tissue. The fascia helps support this by allowing for the gliding and protection. 

3. It’s all connected. Need I say more? Probably on my next post, we’ll explore this more. I’ll leave you with this…a tight trap directly impacts your jaw and neck…it also impacts the mobility of the spine and neck. It may also impact the way you stand, favoring one side vs the other to elevate pain. It’s all connected.

4. I’m going to try and do Myofascia release as many times a week as I can. And watching for areas of my body that start to feel tight, less mobile and less gliding and experiment a little with MFR in those areas. 

5. MFR Rad balls might just be the gift everyone I know gets this year…because tennis balls might be nice or lacrosse balls, but these Rad ones are just amazing. We have them at the studio if you want to grab a set…

And yes, this class will be back. I’m just not sure exactly when. And it’s getting even more integrated into our 200 hour YTT, because this work is so important as we talk about all bodies and age and health of the tissue. This is a tool everyone needs to have. 

Curious to learn more? Send me a note…I’m here to learn and explore with you! 

Until next time, 

Brooke